WZ  I  00 

S857H2 

1912 


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ONE  thing 
sure,  no 
one  ever 
suffers  from  the 
effects  of  medica- 
tion after  visiting 
an  Osteopath. 

—  Charles  E,  Still 


il 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/andrewtaylorstilOOhubbiala 


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I  c/4ndrew  Taylor  Still  ( 

Being  a  Little  Journey  to  the 

Home  of  the  Founder 

of  Osteopathy 

Elbert  Hubbard 


Done  into  a  Book  by  The  Roy  crofters,  at  their 
Shop,  which  is  in  East  Aurora,  New  York,  mcmxii 


Copyright,  1912 
By  Elbert  Hubbard 


A  Little  Journey  to  the  Home  of 
ANDREW  TAYLOR   STILL 

By  ELBERT  HUBBARD 

T  was  about  the  year  Eighteen  Hundred  Fifty- 
seven  that  Henry  Ward  Beecher  entered  his  pulpit 
S^  one  Sunday  morning,  and  announced  to  his  con- 
«1  gregation  that  he  wanted  a  thousand  dollars  to 
buy  Bibles  for  poor  people  in  Kansas.  He  said  the 
matter  was  absolutely  imperative,  and  he  would 
not  go  on  with  the  services  until  the  money  was  raised. 
€L  The  Plymouth  Church  congregation  had  faith  in  Henry 
Ward  Beecher,  so  they  simply  raised  the  money  as  a 
matter  of  course. 

And  the  next  day  Henry  Ward  Beecher  took  the  thousand 
dollars,  and  bought  Sharpe's  rifles  and  shipped  them  to 
Old  John  Brown  m  Kansas. 

One  of  these  "  Bibles  "  was  given  to  Major  Pond,  and  he, 
in  turn,  presented  me  the  document,  after  he  no  longer 
had  use  for  it.  I  have  it  now,  with  his  initials  cut  on  the 
butt,  with  several  notches  adjacent.  Just  what  these 
notches  stand  for,  I  do  not  know. 
Another  of  these  Bibles  was  given  to  a  yoimg  medicus, 


UJ7:/oo 

[6]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

Major  Andrew  Taylor  Still,  who  was  surgeon  to  the  troop 
of  which  Old  John  Brown  was  in  command.  The  first  time  I 
heard  of  Doctor  Still  was  from  the  lips  of  Major  Pond. 
We  were  out  barnstorming  the  one-night  stands,  and  when 
topics  of  conversation  ran  short,  the  Major  always  talked 
about  either  Henry  Ward  Beecher  or  Old  John  Brown. 
<[  Major  Pond  had  followed  the  footsteps  of  John  Brown 
from  Pennsylvania  to  Ohio,  Ohio  to  Iowa,  Iowa  to  Kansas. 
€L  These  fighters  for  freedom  had  no  commissary,  and  they 
took  no  prisoners.  They  lived  off  of  the  country.  They  were 
all  pioneers,  at  home  in  the  open,  and  even  when  alone 
were  in  good  company,  for  they  were  on  good  terms  with 
the  stars,  with  the  clouds,  with  bee-trees,  deer,  flowing 
springs,  raccoons,  opossums,  and  the  entire  world  of  happy, 
exuberant,  lavish  Nature. 

Doctor  Still  was  physician  to  that  whole  "  deestrick." 
He  was  twenty-eight  years  of  age  when  Pond  first  met 
him,  and  Pond  was  only  twenty.  So  between  them  lay  the 
gulf  of  years,  for  a  boy  of  twenty  regards  a  man  of  twenty- 
eight  as  a  veteran. 

Surgeon  Still  once  set  a  broken  wrist  for  young  Jim  Pond, 
and  thereby  was  he  fixed  in  the  memory  of  the  man  who 
was  to  become  lecture  manager  for  Henry  Ward  Beecher. 
d  The  homely,  commonsense  skill  of  Major  Still  in  min- 
istering to  the  afflicted,  the  sick  or  the  injured,  commanded 
the  great  respect  of  Jim  Pond  and  everybody. 
Major  Still  was  a  man  of  education. 

Incidentally,  he  could  go  out  and  bring  back  a  deer  when 
no  one  else  knew  where  the  deer  were  «•»  £•► 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [  7  ] 

^I'HE  other  day  I  saw  a  picture  of  the  Reverend  Abram 
%iX'  Still,  father  of  Andrew  Taylor  Still,  reproduced  from 
an  old  daguerreotype.  As  I  glanced  at  this  picture,  I 
involuntarily  said,  "  John  Brown."  There  was  something 
essentially  alike  in  the  countenances  of  these  two  men — 
lean,  homely,  earnest,  intellectual,  stubborn — their  high- 
combed  hair  bristling  with  the  essence  of  honesty  s^  s^ 
Call  them  religious  fanatics  if  you  please.  In  any  event, 
they  were  men  of  high-power  potencies. 
And  then,  at  the  same  time,  I  saw  a  picture  of  Mrs.  Martha 
P.  Still,  the  mother  of  Andrew  Taylor  Still — a  strong, 
earnest,  noble  woman,  with  a  square  head  and  a  firm  jaw, 
fit  mate  for  a  man  who  was  to  fight  not  only  with  the 
elements,  with  poverty,  with  stupidity,  but  who  was  also 
to  make  a  great  fight  for  human  rights. 


WT  is  a  splendid  thing  to  be  well  born.  ^  The  parents  of 
Jc  Andrew  Taylor  Still  were  people  with  personality,  plus. 
They  had  health,  physical  strength,  mentality. 
Andrew  Taylor  Still  was  bom  in  the  year  Eighteen  Hun- 
dred Twenty-eight,  near  Jonesboro,  Lee  County,  Virginia. 
€i  Look  this  up  on  the  map  and  you  will  find  it  is  in  the 
Blue  Ridge  Mountains,  a  part  of  the  country  which  even 
yet  is  off  the  beaten  track  of  civilization. 
These  Virginia  mountaineers  were  descendants  of  royalty, 
and  some  of  this  royalty  was  sent  out  of  England  for 
England's  good.  It  was  a  matter  of  the  survival  of  the 
fittest,  and  in  the  mountains  they  formed  a  law  unto 
themselves. 


[8]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

Abraham  Lincoln  was  of  the  same  breed — long  of  limb, 
lean,  sinewy,  bony,  possessed  of  tremendous  physical 
strength,  moving  slowly  but  surely  toward  the  goal. 
This  is  the  essential  tjrpe  of  the  Virginia  mountaineer  s^  s^ 
Abram  Still  was  a  Methodist  preacher,  a  circuit-rider, 
whose  fortune  it  was  to  live  all  of  his  life  on  the  border- 
land of  civilization. 

Whether  Andrew  Taylor  Still  had  ever  gone  to  school  or 
not,  he  would  have  been  an  educated  man,  in  the  sense 
that  he  was  a  well-balanced  man.  He  knew  the  laws  of 
health  intxiitively,  and  had  the  ability  to  take  care  of  him- 
self. Self-preservation  is  the  first  law  of  the  mountaineer. 
C  But  his  parents  were  sticklers  for  "  schooling."  They 
believed  in  discipline,  and  certainly  they  did  not  spare 
the  rod.  One  of  the  penalties  for  poor  spelling  was  to  be 
obliged  to  sit  on  a  horse's  skull,  and  nobody  knows  how 
many  sharp  points  there  are  on  a  horse's  skull  until  he  has 
sat  on  one.  And  just  remember  that  the  days  of  under- 
clothes have  come  since  the  boyhood  of  Doctor  Still. 
Perhaps  this  was  the  beginning  of  the  Science  of  Oste- 
opathy, or  the  Science  of  Right  Adjustment  of  bones  to 
tissue  s^  **  

WN  the  year  Eighteen  Hundred  Thirty-seven,  Abram 
Jc  Still  was  appointed  by  the  Methodist  Conference  as 
missionary  to  Missouri.  Missionaries  then  were  physicians 
to  both  soul  and  body. 

Population  moves  on  parallel  lines  East  or  West.  Vir- 
ginians moved  into  Tennessee  and  Kentucky,  and  then 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL [9] 

pushed    on    through    Southern    Indiana    and    Illinois    to 
Missouri  6^  s^ 

Abram  Still  was  the  first  Methodist  preacher  in  North- 
western Missouri.  The  country  was  unsurveyed  and 
unmapped,  and,  for  the  most  part,  there  were  no  roads — 
only  trails  following  the  path  of  deer  and  buffalo,  over 
which  the  Indian  tramped  in  moccasined  feet. 
The  preacher  built  a  log  cabin  in  the  woods,  with  the 
help  of  his  family.  And  this  log  cabin  was  a  school,  a  church, 
a  doctor's  office  and  a  home,  until  other  buildings  could 
be  built  s^  s^ 

Down  at  La  Plata  was  a  school  conducted  by  the  Reverend 
Samuel  Davidson,  of  the  Cumberland  Presbyterian  Church. 
The  Methodists  did  not  think  much  of  the  Presbyterians, 
but  Mrs.  Still  was  intent  on  giving  her  children  educational 
advantages.  So  Andrew  was  bundled  off  through  the 
woods,  all  of  his  worldly  goods  tied  up  in  a  red  handker- 
chief, headed  for  the  center  of  light  and  learning. 
Much  to  the  surprise  of  young  Andrew,  he  found  the 
Presbyterian  preacher  a  very  gentle,  kind  and  considerate 
man.  The  preacher  and  his  wife  took  the  boy  into  their 
household  and  treated  him  as  if  he  were  their  own  son. 
And  he,  in  turn,  helped  them.  He  split  rails,  milked  cows, 
made  garden,  took  care  of  the  babies,  cooked,  washed 
and  scrubbed.  He  was  what  you  call  a  "  handy  boy." 
Of  course,  he  hunted  and  fished.  Everybody  did  then. 
And  so  the  boy  grew  in  body  and  in  brain.  He  watched 
the  miracle  of  the  seasons,  the  sugar-bush,  the  freshet 
that  carried  away  the  bridge,  the  first  Spring  flowers  that 


[10]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

came  peeping  from  beneath  the  snow  on  the  South  side 
of  rotting  logs ;  he  saw  the  trees  bursting  into  leaf,  the 
white  hills  flecked  with  blossoms  of  cherry  and  haw- 
thorn. There  were  coon  hunts  by  moonlight,  tracks  of 
deer  by  the  salt-lick,  bears  in  the  green  com,  harvest- 
time,  hog-killing  days,  frost  upon  the  pumpkin  and  fodder 
in  the  shock,  wild  turkeys  in  the  clearing,  revival-meetings, 
spelling-bees,  debates,  hard  cider,  occasional  fights  at 
the  store,  barn-raisings,  quilting-bees,  steers  to  break, 
colts  to  ride,  apple  butter,  soft  soap,  pickled  pigs'  feet, 
smoked  hams,  side-meat,  shelled  hickory-nuts  and  walnuts, 
coonskins  on  the  barn-door,  Winter  and  the  first  fall  of 
snow,  with  the  tracks  of  wild  things  to  be  chased  and 
followed,  boots  to  grease,  harnesses  to  mend,  back-logs, 
and  all  of  the  various  manifestations  of  pioneer  life,  where 
the  days  were  packed  full  and  the  nights  were  sacred  to 
sleep;  when  tired  Nature  rested  without  wakening  and 
the  morning  came  all  too  soon. 


^JNDREW'S  desire  was  to  be  a  circuit-rider,  like  his 
X^  father,  but  his  experience  with  the  good  Presbyterian 
preacher  was  a  great  enlightener,  as  he  discovered  that 
Presbyterians  were  pretty  nearly  as  good  as  Methodists. 
And  later  he  discovered  that  all  denominations  were  very 
much  alike  ;  it  is  largely  a  matter  of  temperament.  Much  of 
the  business  of  the  circuit-rider  was  ministering  to  the  phys- 
ical needs  of  the  people  as  well  as  the  spiritual  and  the  mental. 
In  fact,  it  was  not  so  very  long  ago  that  the  three  learned 
professions  were   all   incorporated  in  one  individual  *•»  s^ 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [11] 

So  Andrew  Taylor  Still,  along  about  his  nineteenth  or 
twentieth  year,  decided  to  become  a  physician.  And  so 
he  attended  the  Medical  College  at  Kansas  City,  and  in 
due  time  began  to  practise  with  his  father  and  an  elder 
brother  who  was  also  a  physician. 

He  became  a  general  practitioner,  and  every  sort  of  ail- 
ment that  flesh  was  heir  to  he  ministered  to. 
The  Reverend  Abram  Still  had  gotten  into  difficulties 
with  his  neighbors,  on  account  of  his  conscientious  stand 
on  the  subject  of  slavery.  Those  early  mountaineers  of 
Virginia  did  not  own  black  men.  In  fact,  they  were  the 
first  Abolitionists  s^  s^ 

Thomas  Jefferson  owned  slaves,  but  he  devised  in  his  will 
that  all  of  his  slaves  should  be  made  free  on  his  death. 
And  any  one  reading  the  life  of  Thomas  Jefferson  will 
find  statements  expressing  his  dissatisfaction  with  the 
"  institution."  Thomas  Jefferson  had  a  goodly  trace  of  the 
mountaineer  in  his  own  composition.  But  he  got  mixed 
up  with  the  planters  and  fell  heir  to  a  big  estate  on  which 
were  located  a  good  many  of  the  dusky  chattels. 
But  Abram  Still  was  not  so  unfortunate.  Andrew  Taylor 
Still  was  an  Abolitionist  by  prenatal  tendency.  He  drank 
it  in  with  his  mother's  milk. 

Missouri  was  the  great  battle-ground  of  the  abolition  idea 
in  the  Fifties,  and  the  whole  family  of  Still  found  it  very 
convenient  to  move  out  of  Missouri  into  Kansas,  in  order 
to  save  their  epidermis  free  from  puncture  s^  *•► 
Young  Doctor  Still  practised  almost  all  over  the  Territory 
of  Kansas,  and,  naturally,  he  got  into  the  border  war, 


[12] ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

which  evolved  into  a  civil  war,  about  the  year  Eighteen 

Hundred  Fifty-five. 

The  slavery  and  pro-slavery  bands  were  arrayed  against 

each  other.  Whether  Kansas  should  be  "  slave  "  or  "  free  " 

— ^that  was  the  question  s^  s^ 

Doctor  Still  stood  for  freedom,  not  only  for  himself,  but 

for  other  people,  white  and  black. 

And  when  Old  John  Brown  reached  Kansas,  along  about 

the  year  Eighteen  Hundred  Fifty-seven,  that  he  should 

run  across  Doctor  Still  was  quite  the  most  natural  thing 

in  the  world.  

CV^iT  HEN  the  first  Kansas  Legislature  was  convened,  in 
\(4%  Eighteen  Himdred  Fifty-seven,  Doctor  Still  was 
one  of  the  members. 

The  question  of  slavery,  like  everything  else,  seems  to  be 
a  point  of  view.  Those  who  owned  slaves  looked  upon  the 
Abolitionists  as  "  nigger  thieves." 

Their  argument  was  that  if  the  Abolitionists  did  not  want 
to  hold  slaves,  they  need  n't,  but  that  they  should  not 
interfere  with  those  who  did  s^  s^ 

It  was  a  wonderful  experience  of  Doctor  Still,  as  fighter, 
practitioner,  army  surgeon.  He  helped  begin  the  Civil 
War  five  years  before  Sumter  was  fired  upon.  He  min- 
istered to  friend  and  foe  alike.  If  there  was  any  fighting  to 
be  done,  he  fought.  He  fought  for  the  thing  he  believed 
was  right  and  true  and  just ;  and  where  there  were  bones 
to  set,  starving  people  to  feed,  and  sick  people  to  minister 
to,  whether  they  wore  the  gray  or  the  blue  made  no  dif- 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [  13  ] 

ference,  he  was  there.  Always  and  forever,  Surgeon  Still 
was  on  the  side  of  humanity.  He  was  a  human  being. 
He  was  right  on  the  firing-line — and  he  has  been  there 
ever  since  s^  s^ 

BUT  the  one  thing  that  this  man  was  to  do  to  impress 
humanity  was  to  come  later.  The  Science  of  Osteop- 
athy then  existed  in  his  mind  only  as  a  germ.  He  was  a 
doubter  by  nature,  and  curiously  enough,  according  to  the 
Law  of  Paradox,  a  doubter  is  a  man  with  faith  plus.  In 
order  to  progress,  you  have  to  have  faith  that  there  is 
something  better  ahead,  and  naturally  you  doubt  the 
perfection  of  the  present  order. 

Doctor  Still,  happily  married,  had  settled  down  to  farm- 
ing and  practising  medicine. 

Only  a  man  living  much  by  himself,  on  the  borderland  of 
civilization  and  with  the  beautiful  indifference  to  all  that 
had  been  done  and  said  before,  could  have  broken  up  the 
ankylosis  of  orthodox  medicine. 

Doctor  Still  was  a  Naturalist.  Every  plant  and  herb  and 
root  and  flower  and  leaf  that  had  medicinal  qualities  was 
known  to  him.  He  pinned  his  faith  to  the  simple  things. 
€L  And  we  must  remember  that  this  was  a  time  when  all 
physicians  practised  palliation.  If  they  could  relieve  a 
man  from  pain,  they  congratulated  themselves  that  he 
was  cured. 

Doctor  Still  had  imagination  enough  to  see  that  behind 
the  symptom  was  the  cause.  And  he  was  always  searching, 
out  the  reason  why  &^  £•► 


[14]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

I  believe  he  is  the  first  man  in  history  to  frankly  say  that, 
strictly  speaking,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  disease. 
These  individual,  specific  things  that  we  call  disease,  six 
hundred  of  which,  or  more,  are  recorded  in  the  books,  are 
only  symptoms  of  certain  conditions  s*  &^ 
Let  a  man  violate  the  laws  of  Nature,  be  under-nourished, 
overfed,  disturbed  mentally,  or  let  pressure  of  bone  play 
upon  the  arteries,  thus  disturbing  the  circulation,  or  bone 
press  upon  nerve,  and  this  individual  may  have  one  or  a 
dozen  of  these  so-called  diseases. 

Fever,  chills,  pneumonia,  cold  in  the  head,  granulated 
eyelids,  lumbago,  Bright's  disease,  rheumatism,  colic, 
croup,  measles — these  things  all  trace  back  to  some  specific, 
individual  cause.  And  what  this  cause  was.  Doctor  Still 
made  it  his  business  to  ascertain. 

From  Eighteen  Hundred  Sixty  to  Eighteen  Hundred 
Seventy-four  he  thought,  studied,  observed,  compared,  and 
finally  there  was  worked  out  in  his  mind  a  clear  and  specific 
science,  which  is  now  known  as  the  Science  of  Osteopathy. 
C  On  June  Twenty-second,  Eighteen  Hundred  Seventy- 
four,  having  written  out  his  thesis,  he  gave  it  to  the  world. 
CL  It  was  a  great  white  milestone  on  the  pathway  of 
progress  s^  &^ 

^frHE  science  of  medicine  dates  back  to  Hippocrates, 
Vl'  who  lived  in  Athens  during  that  wonderful  period 
known  as  "  The  Age  of  Pericles." 

Before  Hippocrates,  medicine  and  priestcraft  were  one. 
Incantations  were  a  big  factor  in  the  healing  art.  The  belief 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [15] 

was  general  that  sickness  came  from  a  devil  taking  pos- 
session of  the  human  body.  So  hideous  sounds  and  dis- 
gusting smells  played  their  parts  in  driving  out  the  intruder 
who  had  jumped  the  cosmic  claim  s^  s^ 
Hippocrates  seems  to  have  discovered  that  certain  poisons 
had  a  direct  chemical  effect.  He  had  four  powerful  drugs 
that  brought  about  an  effect  that  he  could  definitely  fore- 
tell. These  were  a  purgative,  a  diuretic,  a  diaphoretic  and 
an  emetic.  In  the  giving  of  these  drugs,  cause  and  effects 
could  be  followed.  It  was  sequence  and  consequence ;  and 
thus  far  was  it  scientific. 

The  giving  of  poisons  was  founded  on  the  old  fallacy  that 
the  person  was  possessed  of  an  evil  spirit ;  and  the  whole 
intent  of  the  nauseous  or  poisonous  drugs  was  to  smoke 
the  intruder  out — to  make  it  so  unpleasant  for  him  that  he 
could  not  stay  on  the  premises. 

All  down  the  centuries,  for  twenty-five  himdred  years, 
we  have  seen  the  outcrop  of  this  superstition.  Occasionally, 
here  and  there,  no  doubt,  there  were  physicians  of  common- 
sense.  But  the  voices  of  such  come  to  us  only  in  pianissimo. 
€[  It  was  a  very  presumptuous  thing  for  a  doctor,  edu- 
cated in  an  allopath  school,  to  renounce  his  Alma  Mater, 
break  fellowship  with  his  brothers  of  the  profession,  and 
declare  that  the  entire  science  of  medicine,  so  called,  was 
founded  on  a  superstition.  

^•fHIS  is  practically  what  Doctor  Still  did  in  the  year 
%g^  Eighteen  Hundred  Seventy-four.  It  was  no  hasty 
generalization.  His  conclusion  was  long  in    ripening,  and 


[16]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

he  hesitated  for  a  good  many  years  about  putting  forth 
the  edict. 

Only  a  man  bom  and  bred  in  pioneer  times,  amid  pioneer 
surroundings,  would  have  had  the  courage  and  the  hardi- 
hood to  have  thus  burned  his  bridges  without  thought  of  a 
ferry  or  subway.  If  needs  be,  he  would  stand  right  out 
alone  in  the  open  and  fight  it  out.  And  this  is  exactly  what 
he  did.  And  behold,  everything  in  the  way  of  vocabulary  was 
heaved  in  his  direction.  He  was  renounced  and  denounced 
as  a  fanatic,  an  ignoramus,  a  renegade,  a  rebel. 
Doctor  Still,  however,  kept  right  straight  on  the  even 
tenor  of  his  way  &^  Instead  of  giving  his  patients  pre- 
scriptions, written  in  bad  Latin,  and  mystifying  them  with 
terms  and  language  they  did  not  imderstand,  he  talked  to 
them  plainly  in  words  the  import  of  which  they  under- 
stood. He  took  the  patient  into  his  confidence,  kindly, 
gently,  surely.  He  allowed  them  to  state  their  case  and 
explain  their  sjrmptoms,  as  Doctor  Still  understood  per- 
fectly well  that  this  was  a  part  of  the  healing  process. 
il  Doctor  Still  realized  that  we  are  dual  in  our  nature. 
Man  is  made  up  of  matter  and  spirit. 

When  the  spirit  leaves  the  body,  it  is  dead ;  but  as  long  as 
the  spirit  inhabits  his  house  of  clay,  it  is  more  or  less 
master.  Mind  is  king. 

And  so  Doctor  Still  did  not  deny  the  influence  of  spirit 
over  matter — a  thing  which  the  old  medicine  men  had 
practically  done.  He  was  no  metaphysician — and  a  meta- 
physician is  a  man  who  hides  his  opinions  even  from  him- 
self s^  &—■ 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [17] 

The  old  schools  of  medicine  had  been  so  diligent  in  deceiv- 
ing people  that  in  the  course  of  time  they  deceived 
themselves,  thus  proving  the  dictum  that  the  punishment 
of  a  liar  is  that  eventually  he  believes  his  own  lies. 
The  schools  of  medicine  have  been  built  on  textbooks 
written  largely  in  medieval  times.  Lectures  were  given 
explaining  these  textbooks,  and  the  students  were  marked 
for  proficiency  on  their  ability  to  memorize  what  they 
were  told  in  lectures  and  read  in  books.  Any  departure 
from  what  had  been  taught  in  the  book  or  the  lecture  was 
penalized  6^  s^ 

Thus  was  there  a  direct  apostolic  succession  of  ignorance, 
deepening  as  it  went  down  the  ages.  The  business  of  every 
doctor  seemed  to  be  largely  to  protect  and  fight  for  the 
things  that  he  had  been  taught.  He  did  not  iinderstand 
them  or  comprehend  their  import,  but  he  based  his  knowl- 
edge on  what  the  book  said.  If  you  doubted  the  truth  or 
the  accuracy  of  his  statements,  he  proudly  referred  you 
to  the  particular  page  and  paragraph  in  the  book.  That  was 
sufficient  s^  s^ 

But  it  was  n't  sufficient  for  Doctor  Still.  He  took  exception 
to  the  books.  The  first  item  in  his  plan  of  diagnosis  was  to 
get  the  patient  into  a  relaxed,  hopeful  frame  of  mind, 
where  faith  would  play  its  perfect  part. 
Thus  he  allowed  the  patient  to  explain,  and  although  he 
might  know,  beforehand,  all  that  the  patient  had  to  tell, 
he  realized  that  he  was  a  sort  of  Father  Confessor  to  the 
stricken  s»»  s^ 
Then  having  gotten  the  man  into  a  relaxed  condition  of 


[  18  ]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

body,  gotten  rid  of  tensity,  fear,  apprehension,  he  began 
his  manipulations.  He  found  the  sore  spot,  and  then  he 
discovered  for  himself  why  this  spot  was  sore,  and  usually 
he  found  that  there  was  a  pressure  of  bone  on  artery, 
which  disturbed  the  circulation.  His  business  then  was  to 
adjust  the  bones  in  a  scientific  way  so  as  to  relieve  this 
pressure  and  equalize  the  circulation  s^  s^ 
One  thing  sure,  he  discovered  that  pressure  on  nerves  or 
arteries  would  produce  a  disease.  Gradually  he  discovered, 
after  treating  a  great  many  thousand  cases,  that  these 
so-called  diseases  dropped  into  certain  general  types.  So 
gradually  the  manipulation  of  the  bony  structure  of  the 
body  grew  into  a  science,  and  the  relief  of  the  stricken  fol- 
lowed. But  Doctor  Still  bore  in  mind  that  commonsense  was 
the  first  item  not  only  in  the  healing  art,  but  in  living  a  life. 
C  To  be  well,  a  man  must  be  on  good  terms  with  his  wife  and 
his  children  and  his  neighbors.  He  must  think  well  of 
himself  and  think  well  of  Nature.  He  must  love  horses, 
cows,  poultry  and  pets ;  and  the  more  he  was  interested  in 
the  great  seething,  breathing  world  of  out-of-doors,  the 
better  his  chances  were  of  keeping  well. 
But  beyond  this,  a  man's  body  is  a  mechanical  contrivance, 
and  if  the  articulations  are  displaced  or  abnormal,  there 
would  certainly  follow  a  wrong  adjustment,  and  this  mal- 
adjustment would  cause  disease. 


^^NSTEOPATHY  is  simply  the  practise  of  common- 
V*/  sense.  The  obvious  is  the  last  thing  that  men  learn, 
and  especially  learned  men,  for  learned  men  are  mostly 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [  19  ] 

learned  only  in  the  science  of  books,  not  in  the  world  of 
Nature  s^  &^ 

A  good  Osteopath  must  not  only  know  the  science  of 
adjustment  of  the  bony  structure  of  the  human  body,  but 
the  more  he  knows  of  life  in  general  the  better  fitted  he 
is  to  practise  the  healing  art.  "They  little  know  of  England 
who  only  England  know." 

The  man  who  knows  only  one  thing  does  not  know  that. 
CL  Had  Andrew  Taylor  Still  been  merely  a  physician, 
versed  and  deeply  learned  in  all  that  the  books  taught,  he 
never  would  have  evolved  the  Science  of  Osteopathy.  It 
was  hardship,  deprivation,  obstacles,  difficulty,  that 
forced  him  back  on  his  own  inventive  genius. 
Doctor  David  Starr  Jordan  has  said  that  the  value  of 
college  is  in  inverse  ratio  to  the  extent  of  its  equipment. 
This  merely  means  that  where  you  do  too  much  for  a 
youngster  he  will  never  do  much  for  himself.  Creation, 
invention,  the  necessity  of  making  your  own  tools  and 
living  your  own  life,  are  great  factors  in  education. 
I  have  known  Doctor  Still  for  a  great  many  years.  I  have 
heard  him  lecture.  I  have  seen  him  in  the  clinic.  I  have 
burned  brush  with  him  in  the  clearing,  and  discussed  many 
themes,  walking  over  the  fields  and  through  the  woods  and 
down  by  the  creek  *•►  s«» 

Doctor  Still  is  always  more  interested  in  life  than  he  is  in 
medicine.  He  is  more  interested  in  health  than  in  disease. 
He  does  not  look  for  the  abnormal.  He  has  the  ability  to 
keep  in  his  mind  the  ideal  of  perfect  health,  and  toward 
this  end  he  is  always  working.  When  he  writes  or  speaks. 


[20]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

he  is  talking  about  health,  and  his  plan  always  seems  to 
be  to  open  up  the  sluiceway,  to  dynamite  the  rocks  in  the 
channel,  to  clear  a  pathway  through  the  woods.  He  is 
moving  toward  a  certain  definite  point,  and  that  point  is 
health  and  happiness. 

The  pathological  is  more  or  less  abhorrent  to  him,  and  in 
conversation  he  is  always  talking  about  the  wonderful 
things  in  Nature — about  livestock,  steam-engines,  machin- 
ery, and  education  through  co-operation  of  head,  hand  and 
heart.  Health  is  his  hobby.  Medicine  is  only  incidental  &^ 
Here  we  get  a  great,  big,  broad  and  generous  view  of  the 
world.  I  do  not  think  that  he  ever  realized  the  amount  of 
opposition  that  the  laimching  of  Osteopathy  would  bring 
about.  He  was  simply  indifferent  to  it.  He  was  a  fighter  by 
nature  and  the  thing  he  fought  for  was  human  liberty,  the 
right  of  the  individual  to  live  his  own  life,  according  to  the 
dictates  of  his  own  conscience. 

So  it  was  that  he  broke  loose  from  the  world  of  medicine 
and  launched  a  science  of  his  own. 

At  the  same  time,  Doctor  Still  has  never  been  dogmatic 
in  his  attitude  of  promulgating  Osteopathy.  He  realizes 
that  it  is  a  science  that  is  in  progress,  that  the  whole  thing 
is  more  or  less  fluid.  He  does  not  want  to  ossify  it  or  crystal- 
lize it.  He  simply  tells  what  he  thinks  is  true,  and  relates 
what  he  has  found  in  his  long  and  varied  experience. 
Originally,  he  had  no  intent  of  foimding  a  school.  He  was 
living  a  life,  and  his  defiance  of  the  old-school  methods  was 
simply  an  announcement  that  thereafter  he  was  going  to 
treat  patients  according  to  his  highest  light  s^  s%^ 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL [21] 

^JND  the  patients  came  to  him  in  wagons,  on  stretchers, 
JX  hobbling  on  crutches  and  canes ;  and  thousands  of  them 
left  their  crutches  and  canes  and  braces  piled  up  in  his 
front  yard.  If  people  could  pay — all  right;  if  people 
could  n't  pay — all  right !  Doctor  Still  was  n't  much  of  a 
businessman  so  far  as  money  was  concerned. 
It  was  about  the  year  Eighteen  Hundred  Ninety  that 
Doctor  Still  conceived  the  idea  of  founding  a  school  of 
medicine,  and  this  was  done  simply  in  self-defense. 
At  this  time  Doctor  Still  lived  in  Kirksville,  Missouri.  He 
was  a  farmer  and  a  physician.  People  were  coming  for 
hundreds  of  miles  to  be  treated.  It  was  more  than  a  local 
craze.  Those  who  were  cured  went  away  and  proclaimed 
the  glad  tidings.  People  came  in  such  crowds  that  they 
sort  of  took  possession  of  the  town. 

Doctor  Still  had  taught  quite  a  number  of  yoimg  men  how 
to  perform  the  manipulations,  and  essentially  they  had 
gotten  his  idea  and  methods  fixed  in  their  minds.  They 
became  experts,  so  to  speak,  in  the  science  of  right  adjust- 
ment s^  s^ 

Some  of  the  young  men  and  women  who  had  been  cured 
were  anxious  to  learn  the  art  and  go  out  and  practise  it. 
And  so  a  little  one-room  cottage  was  secured,  where  lessons 
were  given  to  these  disciples  daily. 

Doctor  Charles  E.  Still,  son  of  the  "  Old  Doctor,"  had 
taken  a  turn  in  various  colleges  and  hospitals  in  New  York, 
Chicago,  Philadelphia  and  Boston.  Now  he  buckled  right 
down  to  business  with  his  father  and  worked  sixteen  hours 
a  day  s^  s^ 


[22]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

So  the  business  grew.  Soon  the  little  cottage  was  too  small, 
and  a  lecture-hall  was  erected.  Other  buildings  were  built 
in  due  course  s^  s^ 

In  Nineteen  Hundred,  Doctor  George  M.  Laughlin,  who 
had  married  one  of  the  daughters  of  Old  Doctor  Still,  was 
given  an  interest  in  the  School.  And  it  was  a  lucky  day  for 
Osteopathy,  for  Laughlin  is  a  man  of  rare  ability. 


BECENTLY  I  made  a  little  journey  to  Kirksville  and 
spent  a  very  happy  two  days  mixing  with  students, 
professors  and  patients. 

The  Kirksville  School  of  Osteopathy  now  occupies  a  dozen 
buildings  or  more.  There  are  two  magnificent  brick  struc- 
tures, with  offices,  auditorium  and  lecture-halls,  and  some- 
thing like  fifty  rooms  where  treatments  are  given. 
There  is  never  a  loss  for  patients.  Daily  clinics  are  held, 
and  the  professor  making  the  diagnosis  and  giving  treat- 
ment lectures  to  the  class.  Every  kind  and  condition  of 
stricken  humanity  that  can  be  imagined  is  to  be  found  here 
— young  and  old,  rich  and  poor,  learned  and  illiterate, 
they  come  for  treatment. 

No  place  in  the  world  offers  such  opportunities  for  the 
study  of  the  healing  art  as  Kirksville  s^  s^ 
Various  other  colleges  and  schools,  founded  on  so-called 
similar  lines,  have  been  started  in  various  parts  of  the 
country  since  the  School  was  founded,  twenty  years  ago. 
But  Kirksville  is  the  home  of  Osteopathy.  It  is  the  home  of 
Doctor  Andrew  Taylor  Still,  of  Doctor  Charles  E.  Still, 
of  Doctor  George  M.  Laughlin  and  of  Doctor  George  Still, 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [  23  J 

a  highly  skilled  surgeon,  a  nephew  of  the  Old  Doctor  s^ 
These  four  men,  ably  assisted  by  E.  C.  Brott  as  business 
manager,  have  built  up  this  institution. 
Emerson  says  that  every  great  institution  is  the  lengthened 
shadow  of  a  man.  This  is  certainly  true  of  the  College  of 
Osteopathy  in  Kirks ville. 

There  are  more  than  seven  hundred  students  in  attendance. 
About  one-third  of  these  are  women.  And  I  was  interested 
and  pleased  to  note  that  women,  for  the  most  part,  are 
the  best  students  of  Osteopathy,  and,  as  a  rule,  make  a 
decided  success  of  the  profession. 

Women  make  good  physicians.  The  great  welling  mother- 
heart  is  able  to  extend  its  ministrations  and  look  after  the 
needs  of  a  great  number  of  people  s^  s^ 
Osteopathy  does  not  pretend  to  know  all  about  it.  No 
school  of  medicine  is  so  wholly  right  it  can  afford  to  say 
that  all  others  are  wholly  wrong. 

There  is  good  in  everything,  otherwise  the  thing  could  not 
have  existed  at  all.  Recognizing  this.  Osteopathy  seeks  to 
make  use  of  every  idea,  every  appliance,  every  invention, 
that  can  be  of  service  to  stricken  humanity. 
At  Kirksville  is  a  complete  chemical  laboratory.  There  is 
probably  as  fine  a  hospital  equipment  as  can  be  found  any- 
where in  America,  with  skilled  men  to  operate  when  the 
needs  demand  s«»  s^ 

Of  course,  the  main  thing  in  Osteopathy  is  the  "  right 
adjustment,"  and  this,  in  the  vast  number  of  instances, 
brings  relief.  This  is  the  secret  of  Osteopathy,  if  there  is 
any  secret  in  it,  which  of  course  there  is  n't,  because  it 


[24]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

belongs  to  everybody  and  anybody  who  can  comprehend, 
absorb  and  utilize  it  *•»  s» 

I  noticed  that  these  students  at  Kirksville  had  not  been 
"  sent  to  college  "  ;  they  had  gone  of  their  own  accord  and 
free  will.  Many  of  them,  doubtless,  have  made  sacrifices 
in  order  to  avail  themselves  of  these  educational  facilities, 
and  so  they  improve  the  time.  The  loafer  does  not  get  in, 
at  Kirksville. 

I  had  the  pleasure  of  speaking  to  the  entire  school  body, 
and  I  noticed  the  wonderful  receptive  spirit  that  the  stu- 
dents possessed.  They  were  a  very  healthy,  happy,  strong, 
earnest,  good-natured  lot  of  men  and  women. 
In  no  college  where  I  have  ever  spoken — and  I  have  spoken 
in  schools,  colleges  and  universities  all  over  the  United 
States,  in  England,  Scotland,  Ireland  and  France — have  I 
ever  seen  a  more  earnest,  receptive,  commonsense  lot  of 
students  s^  *•► 

They  are  drilled,  not  only  in  the  science  of  healing,  but 
are  likewise  taught  the  necessity  of  keeping  well  themselves. 
<L  As  a  body,  doctors  are  not  very  good  insurance  risks. 
They  are  apt  to  overstimulate,  overeat  and  underbreathe, 
and  if  not  driven  out  by  the  necessities  of  their  work  into 
the  open,  they  will  sit  around  a  red-hot  stove  and  read 
musty  books  and  medical  magazines  devoted  to  the  mys- 
terious, the  abnormal  and  the  unusual. 
The  Osteopath  is  a  very  good-natured  man.  Also,  he  is  a 
hard-working  man. 

Osteopathy  is  not  only  a  profession;  it  is  also  a  business. 
If  you  benefit  people  and  bestow  upon  them  a  service,  they 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [  25  ] 

should  pay  you  for  it.  Charity  has  no  place  in  the  modem 
economic  world.  A  service  that  is  not  paid  for  is  not  appre- 
ciated S^  6^ 

One  thing  sure :  Osteopathy  does  not  poison,  corrupt  and 
kill.  And  I  believe  that  in  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  hun- 
dred it  results  in  a  positive  benefit. 

Opening  up  the  articulations,  relieving  undue  pressure, 
bringing  about  a  complete  relaxation — all  mean  bettered 
circulation  and  consequent  natural  elimination  of  the 
toxins  that  the  body  has  accumulated  and  should  throw 
off.  The  upright  position  was  not  the  original  intent  of 
Nature.  When  man  began  to  walk  on  his  two  hind  feet  he 
put  one  over  on  the  Dame,  and  she  has  been  punishing 
him  ever  since  by  occasionally  giving  him  a  crooked  back- 
bone s^  *•► 

We  are  only  well  and  happy  and  able  to  think,  to  work, 
to  love,  to  endure,  to  succeed,  when  the  spinal  column  is 
able  to  do  its  perfect  work. 

I  notice  that  Osteopaths  do  not  talk  about  "  curing " 
people.  All  that  the  good  physician  can  do  is  allow  Nature 
to  play  through  the  human  organism.  It  is  Nature  heals. 
<L  What  we  all  want  is  to  be  a  good  conductor  of  the 
divine  current,  to  cultivate  the  receptive  mind,  the  hos- 
pitable heart,  and  have  bodies  that  are  fit  dwelling-places 
for  the  Holy  Spirit. 

We  are  bathed  in  an  Ocean  of  Intelligence.  The  world  is 
Spirit.  Spirit  takes  material  forms,  and  one  of  these  material 
forms  is  the  human  body.  The  human  soul  seems  to  be  a 
part  of  the  Great  Spirit,  partially  segregated,  as  it  were,  in 


[26] ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

the  individual  body.  Our  business  is  to  allow  this  divine 

spirit  to  play  through  us.  So  the  happy,  relaxed,  generous 

mood  is  always  the  healthful  mood. 

Take  off  the  pressure  of  hate,  the  stricture  of  jealousy,  the 

weight  of  woe,  and  a  great  good  follows  without  fail. 

Pressure  of  bone  on  nerve,   of  articulation  on  artery — 

these  hinder  the  free  flow  of  the  secretions. 

The  "  manips  "  simply  put  the  machine  in  good  working 

order,  so  that  Nature  has  her  way  and  can  do  her  perfect 

work  s^  s^ 

We  are  part  of  Nature — in  fact,  we  are  Nature.  Nature  is 

our  Mother;  and  the  more  we  love  Nature,  the  more  we 

understand  Nature,  the  more  we  move  with  Nature,  the 

happier  and  better  we  are. 

The  penalties  of  life  are  for  disobedience  of  the  laws  of 

Nature.  The  blessings  of  life  come  from  being  one  with  the 

Universal  Mother. 

No  man  can  hope  to  explain  the  Science  of  Osteopathy  in 

a  single  little  book  like  this.  What  I  am  endeavoring  to  do 

is  to  give  a  general  impression  of  the  work  of  Andrew 

Taylor  Still  and  his  very  able  helpers  who  are  carrying  on 

and  extending  his  ideas. 

That  these  strong,  able  and  commonsense  men  and  women 

have  carried  the  science  of  Osteopathy  beyond  what  the 

Old  Doctor  ever  anticipated,  is  no  doubt  very  true.  This 

the  dear  Old  Doctor,  himself,  to  me  acknowledged  s^  s^ 

Doctor  Charles  E.  Still,  the  practical  head  of  the  School, 

is  a  very  sturdy,  efficient  and  honest  type  of  man.  There 

was  a  livestock  show  on  in  Kirksville  the  day  I  was  there 


ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL  [27] 

last.  "  Doctor  Charlie  "  and  I  attended  the  show,  and 
discussed  horses,  mules,  hogs  and  sheep  with  the  farmers. 
I  noticed  that  Doctor  Charlie  had  the  respect  of  every  one. 
His  neighbors  believe  in  him — his  family  believe  in  him — 
and  he  believes  in  himself.  He  is  a  man  who  has  nothing  to 
hide.  He  is  approachable,  friendly,  kindly,  generous.  He  is 
at  home  anywhere,  with  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men. 
He  is  a  man  to  respect  and  admire  s^  *•» 


m 


E  sat  on  the  veranda,  in  the  beautiful  October  sun, 
and  looked  off  on  the  dying  foliage  that  deepened 
into  the  reds,  the  browns  and  the  russets,  stretching  away 
miles  on  miles  on  every  side. 

"  The  year  is  dying,"  said  the  Old  Doctor.  "  Perhaps  we 
are  all  dying. 

"  I  am  well  past  eighty,  and  the  great  work  down  there 
goes  on  without  me.  It  seems  to  go  even  better  without  me 
than  with  me.  And  yet  I  take  a  hearty  interest  in  it. 
"  All  of  those  boys  and  girls  that  come  here  to  study  are 
my  children.  Only  a  few  of  them  I  know  now  by  name. 
Once  I  knew  every  student  here,  and  a  good  deal  of  his 
history.  I  called  him  by  name  as  we  passed.  This  is  not 
so  now.  The  business  is  growing  beyond  me,  and  I  feel  that 
I  could  pass  away  and  the  work  would  still  go  on. 
"  This  does  not  sadden  me.  I  have  killed  the  Black  Wolf 
of  Death.  The  other  name  of  this  wolf  is  Fear,  and  Fear  is 
in  all  the  pens  of  the  lambs  of  God.  In  all  religious  denomi- 
nations you  will  find  the  element  of  fear  and  the  horror  at 
thought  of  death  s^  &^ 


[28]  ANDREW  TAYLOR  STILL 

"  I  have  seen  many  people  die.  I  have  stood  by  the  bed- 
side and  told  the  man  that  he  would  tomorrow  at  this 
time  be  a  corpse,  and  I  have  never  yet  known  an  individual 
who  was  stripped  for  eternity  who  knew  anything  of  life 
after  this.  It  is  all  belief,  hearsay,  guesswork  s^  s^ 
"  I  know,  however,  that  where  we  keep  the  body  in  good 
working  order,  so  that  all  parts  grow  old  together,  there  is 
no  fear  or  dread  of  death.  Death  is  as  natural  as  life,  and 
just  as  good.  I  am  ready  and  willing  to  go,  confident  that 
the  change  will  be  a  higher  step,  and  that  my  spirit  will 
live  somewhere,  in  some  shape,  and  that  the  Great  Power 
that  has  cared  for  me  all  these  years  here  will  never  desert 
me  there. 

"  The  Great  Architect  of  the  universe  is  on  our  side — He 
is  one  with  us,  and  I  am  ready  to  receive  all  changes  that 
this  Great  Architect  thinks  are  necessary  to  complete  the 
work  for  which  man  was  designed  5^  s^ 
"  Man's  business  is  this :  Know  thyself,  and  be  at  peace 
with  God." 


eVERY  great 
institution  is  the 
lengthened  shadow 
gT  one  man  «%•  <8»  <S* 

RALPH     WALDO     EMERSON 


so  HERE,  THEN,  ENDETH  THE  PREACHMENT 
BY  ELBERT  HUBBARD.  ENTITLED,  "  A  LITTLE 
JOURNEY  TO  THE  HOME  OF  ANDI5EW  TAYLOR 
STILL."  DONE  INTO  PRINT  BY  THE  ROYCROFT- 
ERS,  AT  THEIR  SHOP,  WHICH  IS  IN  EAST 
AURORA,    ERIE    COUNTY,    NEW  YORK,  MCMXII 


Date  Due 

1 

1 

PI.INTED  IN  U.S.*.            CAT.   NO.   24    161               SB 

DR.  C.  E.  STILL 


University  of  California 

SOUTHERN  REGiONAL  LIBRARY  FACiLITY 

405  Hiigard  Avenue,  Los  Angeles,  CA  90024-1388 

Return  this  material  to  the  library 

from  which  it  was  borrowed. 


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r  11  doubt,  tell 
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—  George  Laughtin 


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IND,  fix  it, 
and  let  it 
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Andrew  Taylor  Still 


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